Sunday, 19 February 2012

Personal service

I
know what you lawyers are thinking, but you’re wrong.

Recently
I took my seventeen year old son, who invariably has more money than his
father, to acquire an LED television that would do justice to the X-Box and other
gadgets that partly explain the comparative wealth issue.

We
headed for one of the major electronics retailers where there is a salesman, been
around for a while, who makes the whole experience of parting with lumps of
money less painful. He’s always bright
and cheerful, seems to know a lot about everything, usually up for a bit of a
deal and cracks jokes along the way. Top of the tree.

So
with only vague ideas beyond that we want something rectangular with a wire and
a moving picture, we head in store with eyes peeled for The Man. Let’s call him “Richard” – we always do.

Of
course, he spots us almost before we see him, recognising us from the last
visit five or six months ago and knowing full well who we are looking for. He will be with us as soon as he can (when he
has finished dealing with at least three other people).

Now
here’s the point. I don’t want to deal
with anybody else. There are quite a few
other assistants around, possibly up and coming and good at what they do, waiting to
get better if they are given a few more opportunities. You might say that Richard
should see that it happens, even though it may not necessarily be his
responsibility.

Actually
the choice was mine. I could have said
to any of those guys that I would like some help but we chose to wait for
Richard. He went backwards and forwards,
managing to amuse us just in the way he explained why he would be a little
longer.

Of
course he would be, because once he’s dealing with any particular person he
does not interrupt that to take a telephone call or see somebody else who
happens to have dropped in.

I
understand that only too well. You can’t
give a personal service without observing that discipline.

Yet
what is telling about this little experience is the way that I felt that
Saturday, with no pressures of time and out of the work environment.

I
didn’t have to deal with Richard. It was
my choice to wait. Not only could I see,
and hear from him, that he was busy - I expected
him to be busy when I went into the store.

Notwithstanding
all that, and in my supposedly chilled state, I still felt irritated that I had
to wait to see him. Conclusion is that
sometimes that frustration simply cannot be avoided, whatever resources or
choices are in place. Best answer is
that everybody, on both sides of the table, understands the conundrum.